An informal group greeting among young Italians that signals casual belonging — you'd use it with friends arriving somewhere, never with strangers or elders.
Raga is how young Italians call out to a group of friends — a greeting that lands somewhere between casual announcement and warm recognition. Walk into a room where people know you, and someone might throw out "raga!" to acknowledge everyone at once. It's the sound of informal belonging, used exclusively among peers who share the same social space.
The word emerged from Rome's street culture in the 1980s and 90s, when young Romans started clipping "ragazzi" down to its essential syllables. What began as local slang spread city to city through the organic channels that existed before internet virality: friends moving between Milan and Rome, music crossing regional boundaries, youth culture finding its own national vocabulary. By the 2000s, it had become standard informal speech across Italy.
How you say it still marks where you're from. Romans stress the second syllable — ragà — while Milanese speakers hit the first. The pronunciation variations survived the word's national spread, preserving geographic identity even as the term itself became universal youth language. It's the kind of word that doesn't need explanation among those who use it, which is exactly why it works.